In the not-so-very-distant future, the city formerly known as Austin, Texas, has been walled off to contain a virus. Life inside the Q goes on, with the U.S. government providing shipments of supplies but not much else. Two rival gangs largely control the Q: the Lopez family in the south and the Spencers in the north, where supply shipments come in. Maisie Rojas, 17, is the daughter of the late Isaac Rojas; her father was the Lopez family enforcer. It’s a role Maisie doesn’t think she’s capable of taking over—something her ex-boyfriend, clearly angling for the job, often echoes. Lennon Pierce, 19, lives outside the Q. When Lennon, the black sheep son of a Democratic senator and presidential candidate, is kidnapped and dropped into the Q, he’s found by the Lopez family and becomes the charge of Maisie. In this high-octane novel alternating between Maisie’s and Lennon’s viewpoints, Maisie agrees to lead a mission into Spencer territory to help Lennon escape through the north gate and to hijack the south’s supplies from the Spencers, while Lennon realizes his experience inside the Q is giving him insights about life in the quarantine zone that people on the outside ought to know. The romance that inevitably develops between Maisie and Lennon is just one of the satisfying elements of a fun, fast-paced story in which both characters discover as much about themselves as they do about each other. (Age 12 and older)